The forthcoming Obama Presidential Library, designed by Tod Williams Billie Tsien, will now include a sculptural installation from Maya Lin, according to an announcement made on August 4 by the Obama Foundation.

The sculptural piece, titled “Seeing Through the Universe,” will anchor the library’s newly-announced water garden, which has been named to honor Obama’s late mother, Ann Dunham. It includes a stone oculus and pebble water feature surrounded by pathways leading away from the installation and into the library’s other recently-unveiled outdoor gathering spaces designed by landscape architect Michael Van Valkenburgh.

“When we thought about what may be a fitting way to commemorate my mother’s influence on my sister and me, I thought about where she would want to be in this space,”  this year’s A’22 keynote speaker said in a statement. “I could picture her sitting on one of the benches on a nice summer afternoon, smiling and watching a bunch of kids running through the fountain, and I thought that would capture who she was as well as just about anything else.”

The Vietnam Wall Memorial designer is having a banner year after being named the designer of the Museum of Chinese in America revamp in April. Lin is now attached to another major project expected to draw 70,000 visitors to Chicago's South Side each year as soon as it is completed in 2025. 

“There is something so powerful about a very still flowing use of water so that when you touch the water you change it,” Lin told Oculus about the intention of her new design. “The art doesn't stop when I make the piece, the art actually begins when you start engaging with it.”